Films/DVD Asylum

Posted by Bruce from DC (i) on July 18, 2001 at 10:26:31

In Reply to: Re: Intelligence & Prediction posted by geoffkait on July 17, 2001 at 07:48:11:

"Out of Oil" (1970s)
"Nuclear winter" (1980s)
"Y2k" (1990s)
"Global Warming" (2000s)

See a pattern here?

Tell me this, Geoff: If scientists' ability to predict now whether next winter in a particular region of the US will be cooler than average, warmer than average or just average is a little better than a coin toss (i.e. 50% chance of being correct) -- which it is -- how can these same scientists do any better at predicting the global climate 10 years from now?

That all this stuff makes great news copy and great movies does not mean it's a sound basis for spending billions of dollars and disrupting or dislocating the lives of 100s of thousands of people.

I do agree that its bad public policy to subsidize (through flood insurance) the construction of $1+ million vacation homes on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. But that's because of hurricanes, not because I think the whole place is going to be under 20 feet of water.

guess we should take this Outside, huh, since it's kinda off-topic.

• Outside